Writers and spies

Alas, we’ve never met.
I’m sure you’re beautiful.
Charming.
You’d enjoy veloute du cresson,
fresh flowers at breakfast;
a dry, woodsy wine.

And he laughed.

Writers and spies, he said,
entertain, and rely on
the ones they deceive.

He’d grown up knowing
that all grownups lie,
which they do.
He’d heard of dark alleys,
Double-entendres,
and backrooms.
He loved
to puzzle it out.

Half-way across town,
A young man ties a key
to a bright-blue balloon.
He watches it drift --
Higher, higher –-
Blue into blue.
He imagines the place
It might land.